Long before she became Mrs Downton Abbey,
Elizabeth McGovern was in a very funny sit-com that I believe was called If Not for You. This film is another of
her obscure gems. That is, she’s a gem. The film isn’t, if I remember
correctly.

Christmas, 1942, California.
Seventeen-year-old Henry (Penn) is a reluctant classical piano player. He
prefers jazz. He works in a bowling alley, risking his hands in resetting the
pins. He gets into fights with snooty rich kids at the bowling alley.

He falls for Caddie, the girl who sells
movie tickets and works in the public library. Because she lives in a mansion
he believes she is rich, but she’s the daughter of the maid.

They fall in love. What a surprise. It’s
not much of a story and the characters aren’t very interesting. Henry’s friend
Nicky (Cage) is simply obnoxious. Henry and Nicky are due to ship out with the
marines in a few weeks but it’s hard to be worried.

The film tries but the result is banal,
pretentious and clichéd. Young Penn and McGovern rescue it from complete
oblivion.

Scarlett Johansson
– He’s Just Not That Into You, The Other
Boleyn Girl, The Prestige, The Island, A Love Song for Bobby Long, Girl with
the Pearl Earring, The Man Who Wasn’t There, Manny & Lo

Giovanni Ribisi – The Rum Diary, Public Enemies, The Dead
Girl, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, Cold Mountain, Friends, The Gift,
Saving Private Ryan, SubUrbia, The X Files

Why? Scarlett
Johansson

Seen: Once before.
Now 10 June 2017

A prize-winning movie but the first time
I saw it I was disappointed. I didn’t understand the hype. Maybe I’ll be more
into it this time.

Tokyo. Weary Bob Harris (Murray) is
welcomed by smiling Japanese hotel staff. He’s a famous movie star. Sleepless
in his room he gets faxes from his wife about missed birthdays and shelf
choices. He’s in Tokyo to shoot a whiskey advert. The Japanese director babbles
long-winded instructions. The translator translates a few words.

Bob and Charlotte are both insomniacs.
They meet, finally, in the hotel bar. Several awkward encounters follow.

It’s all very sensitive about two lost
souls in a foreign country. Two lost souls searching for a meaning in their
lives.

It’s always a pleasure to watch Johansson
being subtly expressive but what a boring movie. Even the glimpses into modern
Japan don’t lift it much. I still don’t get the hype. But it does have a classy
tone.

Rafe Spall – The World’s End, Life of Pi, Prometheus, Hot
Fuzz, A Good Year, Shaun of the Dead

Why? Daniel
Radcliffe

Seen: 4 June 2017

Sometimes we need something lightweight.
I’m usually not interested in romantic comedies but one half of the couple is
Daniel Radcliffe after all.

Wallace has been heartbroken and isolated
for more than a year and lives with his sister and a little nephew. Chantry is
an animator and has a boyfriend. Wallace and Chantry meet at a party neither is
enjoying and they connect.

Chantry and her boyfriend really love
each other and have been together for five years. Wallace is not over Megan. So
Chantry and Wallace are just friends. They can be just friends, right?

Well, what do you think?

It’s very talky and they talk so fast
it’s hard to keep up at times. But it’s quite funny with sharp non-mushy
dialogue. Predictable but surprisingly likeable.

Keanu Reeves – The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, The Day the
Earth Stood Still, The House by the Lake, A Scanner Darkly, The Matrix Trilogy,
Sweet November, The Gift, Feeling Minnesota, A Walk in the Clouds, Johnny Mnomic,
Much Ado About Nothing, Dracula, My Own Private Idaho, Bill & Ted’s
Excellent Adventure, Dangerous Liaisons

Sandra Bullock – Gravity, Extremely
Loud and Incredibly Close, The House by the Lake, Crash, Divine Secrets of the
Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Twenty-Eight Days, Practical Magic, While You Were Sleeping

Danny Aiello – The Closer, Do the Right Thing, The January
Man, Moonstruck

Why? Besson.
Oldman. Very good film

Seen: Two or three
times previously. Now 27 May 2017

Assassins are not cool. I mean, come on,
they kill people for money. That is really not OK.

Why then is Léon so cool? Must be the
round shades and the black coat and the too short trouser legs. And the
houseplant. And his friendship with the young Mathilda, the neighbour girl who
lives with her drug dealing dad, hooker mum, abusive older sister and beloved
little brother.

Social realism on a high excitement
level.

Pill-popping, poetic, Beethoven-loving,
totally insane Gary Oldman murders Mathilda’s family while she’s at the
supermarket. Léon takes her in. She finds out he’s a hitman and thinks that’s
cool. She offers to do his housekeeping if he teaches her to be a hitman so she
can kill the men who killed her brother. Léon says no. A lot of good that does.
She may be a little girl but she’s a tough, fast-talking, street smart charmer.

The film is tender, funny and complex.
And exciting.

Jean Reno is perfect as the vulnerable,
ruthless, kind illiterate Léon. Gary Oldman is a brilliant mad villain as only
Gary Oldman can be. Young Natalie Portman is incredible in the star-making
role.

Colin Morgan – Humans, The Fall, The Living and the Dead,
The Huntsman Winter’s War, The Laughing King, Testament of Youth, The Tempest
(on stage at the Globe and the filmed version), Quirke, Merlin, Island, Parked, The Catherine Tate Show, Doctor Who

As a rule I don’t like gangster films but
this is London and Colin Morgan has a small role so I’ll give it a try.

Oh look, Christopher Eccleston is in it
too. A cop. Colin Morgan is Frank, chauffeur to Reggie Kray, one of the
gangster twins. And brother to Frances, who marries Reggie.

Oh look, Nicholas Farrell is in it too. A
psychiatrist who lies, from fear, saying that Ron Kray is sane though he’s
barking mad, or as Farrell puts it in sober medical terms, ‘off his fucking
rocker.’

Oh look, the actor who plays Endeavor is
in it too. And Tara Fitzgerald, as Frank and Frances’s mother. And David
Thewlis.

It’s confusing but interesting. London and the East End of the 60’s are
lovingly portrayed and the psychological study of the two twins – the cheeky,
charming, violent business gangster Reggie, and the psychopathically murderous
but also charming Ron – is well played by Hardy in his best role so far.
Everyone ensnared and enthralled in the twins’ web are well portrayed by
Browning, Morgan and the rest – all actors who deliver as they always do.

The music is good as well – both the live
music and the background 60’s hits.